IT stocks gained despite the temporary suspension of H-1B visa suggests investors’ confidence on localization efforts by Indian IT companies

TCS share price slipped nearly one per cent to trade at Rs 2,010 apiece on BSE as US President Donald Trump announced the suspension of H-1B visas along with other foreign work visas till the end of the year. However, the rest of IT stocks in the index gained after opening lower in Tuesday’s session such as Infosys shares, which were up over one per cent to trade at Rs 712 apiece. IT stocks reeled under pressure in the early morning deals on the back of an announcement made by the US President to block H-1B visas to help the Americans who have lost their jobs in the wake of the economic crisis amid the coronavirus pandemic. “Today, IT stocks gained despite the temporary suspension of H-1B visa suggests investors’ confidence on localization efforts by Indian IT companies (almost 60%+ local workforce in the US) and strong medium-term trajectory of technology demand,” senior analyst Suyog Kulkarni, Reliance Securities, told Financial Express Online.

IT stocks gain:

Despite the US President’s comment on H-1B visas, IT stocks managed to recover. The Nifty IT index was trading 0.5 per cent higher led by gains in Just Dial, MindTree, Tech Mahindra, Infosys shares, which were up in the range of 0.5-5.5 per cent. Vishal Wagh, Head of Research at Bonanza Portfolio Ltd, believes that the announcement made by the US President is in line with the expectations. “IT companies have already started shifting for online meetings and work from home environment in the last three months,” said Wagh, adding that there is no major impact of the news.

Hexaware and TCS share prices capped the gains, down 0.81 per cent and 0.65 per cent, respectively. “In the near term, we believe Indian IT companies to witness challenges in completing projects on time and rely on subcontractors for additional talent demand (which are 10- 20% costlier),” Kulkarni further added.

Meanwhile, domestic share market benchmarks BSE Sensex and Nifty 50 were trading half a per cent higher. Sensex was up 175 points or 0.50 per cent at 35,086, while the Nifty 50 index gained 58 points or 0.56 per cent to rule at 10,369.